Page 26 of Davoren
"Arms up," he commanded, turning back to me with the dress.
The words carried none of the dark honey they'd held minutes ago when he'd used the same tone to position me for pleasure. This was pure efficiency, a Dragon Lord preparing his mate for political theater. But when I raised my arms, my body interpreted the gesture differently, muscle memory singing of chains and denial and promises unfulfilled.
He stepped close enough that his heat washed over my naked skin, and I bit back a whimper. His hands—those same hands that had played my body like an instrument—now moved with clinical precision. He guided the silk over my head, letting it cascade down my body in a whisper of fabric that might as well have been fingernails for how it affected my hypersensitive skin.
Every adjustment he made sent fresh torment through me. Smoothing the fabric over my breasts made my nipples peak harder, visible through the thin silk. His fingers at my waist, ensuring the dress fell properly, made my core clench with renewed desperation. When he stepped behind me to fasten the hidden clasps, his breath on my neck nearly buckled my knees.
"Stand still," he murmured, though his voice carried a thread of strain that suggested he wasn't as unaffected as he appeared.
The dress had been designed with deliberate intent. The neckline framed my collar perfectly, the deep blue silk making my skin gleam like captured moonlight. The cut left my arms bare, displaying the golden lines that spiraled down them like living tattoos. The hem fell to mid-thigh, shorter than propriety demanded but long enough to preserve the illusion of modesty. Every element had been chosen to make a statement: I was claimed, transformed, beyond the reach of human law or contract.
"The collar stays," Davoren said, his fingers brushing the dragon-scale at my throat. That simple touch sent lightning straight to my core, and I couldn't suppress the soft gasp that escaped. His eyes flared brighter for a moment, and through the bond I felt his desire spike to match mine before he ruthlessly suppressed it. "Solmar must see you are claimed. Must understand that you wear my mark in every way that matters."
He moved to face me fully, and now I saw Davoren in all his cold fury. His ember eyes had shifted to something harder, more ancient. The lover who'd called me 'little one' with such dark affection had been locked away behind walls of necessity and protocol.
"Varek Solmar is my subject within the Fire Wastes," he said, his tone taking on the quality of a military briefing. "He holds territory under my sufferance, pays tribute for the privilege of his trade routes through my domain. Ancient Law forbids me from harming him, no matter the provocation." His jaw clenched at those words, and I saw how much that restriction chafed. "He knows this. He counts on it. He will push boundaries specifically because he knows I cannot retaliate with force."
My merchant's mind immediately understood the game. Solmar would use Davoren's restrictions against him, would test every limit knowing the Dragon Lord's hands were tied by laws older than human civilization. It was the kind of calculated risk my father would have admired, if it weren't aimed at reclaiming me like lost cargo.
"You will remain silent unless I command otherwise," Davoren continued, his hands coming to rest on my shoulders. The weight of them grounded me even as his touch sent fresh need spiraling through our bond. "You are my bonded mate, sealed by magic that predates his entire bloodline. Show no fear. No uncertainty. You belong to a Dragon Lord, and that places you above every human law he might invoke."
"And if he addresses me directly?" I managed to ask, though my voice came out rougher than intended.
"Then you wait for my permission to respond." His thumbs traced small circles on my shoulders, and I wasn't sure if he meant the gesture to comfort or remind me of my place. Perhaps both. "He will try to provoke you, to make you doubt your choice. Remember that his words are wind against stone. They cannot touch what we are."
What we are.
Bonded.
Mated.
In ways that human marriage could never achieve.
The incompleteness of our interrupted scene thrummed between us like a living thing, making every breath an effort. My body still ached for him, still clenched around emptiness that felt like grief. Through the bond, I felt his matching frustration, his barely leashed need to finish what we'd started.
"When this is done," he said, his voice dropping to that register that bypassed my ears entirely, "when I've dealt with Solmar's presumption, you will return to those chains. We will finish your lesson properly. You will scream my name until your throat is raw, come until you can't remember any sensation but my touch. This interruption changes nothing except how desperate you'll be by the time I finally let you fall."
The promise in those words made my thighs clench, made the ache between them pulse with renewed demand. Three denied edges had left me balanced on a knife of need, and now I had to walk into a political confrontation while my body screamed for release.
He stepped back, assessing my appearance with the same precision he'd brought to everything. Whatever he saw must have satisfied him, because he nodded once, sharp and decisive.
"Come," he commanded, moving toward the chamber door. "Let us show Varek Solmar what he can never have.
The Great Hall opened before us like the throat of some primordial beast, ready to swallow anyone foolish enough to enter. The ceiling vanished into shadows so deep they seemed solid, stretching up hundreds of feet until architecture became suggestion rather than fact. My neck ached trying to follow the carved columns that supported all that invisible weight, each one thick as an ancient oak and twisted into shapes that hurt to track with human eyes.
The heat hit differently here—not the intimate warmth of Davoren's chambers but something vast and threatening. Veins of pressurized magma glowed behind panels of obsidian that must have been three feet thick, casting everything in a red light that turned skin to copper and shadows to blood. The panels had been carved with precision that let just enough light through to illuminate while maintaining the barrier between us and liquid stone that could incinerate flesh in seconds. The craftsmanship was deliberate intimidation—look at what power contains, what forces serve at my command.
The Obsidian Throne dominated the far end of the hall like a statement of intent. It hadn't been carved so much as grown, sprouting from a raised dais of volcanic glass that seemed to have erupted from the floor and frozen mid-flow. The throne itself was a masterwork of intimidation—high-backed enough to dwarf even Davoren's considerable height, with armrests carved to resemble dragon claws gripping spheres of crystallized flame. Behind it, the largest magma vein pulsed with a rhythm that matched my accelerated heartbeat, as if the volcano's heart beat directly behind the seat of power.
Twelve guards flanked the space before the dais in perfect formation, their armor gleaming despite the oppressive atmosphere. They held themselves at attention, but I caught the subtle shifts—weight moving from foot to foot, hands adjusting on weapon hilts, the occasional dart of eyes toward the magma veins. They were terrified, trying not to show it, failing in ways only someone trained to read body language would notice.
At their center stood Varek Solmar, and my first thought was that he'd dressed for the wrong audience.
His white silk ensemble—jacket, pants, even his boots—had been chosen to project wealth and purity against the volcanic backdrop. Instead, the magma-light turned the white to dirty orange, made him look like a child who'd worn his best clothes to a volcano and couldn't understand why they kept getting singed. His silver hair, usually his most striking feature, looked like cheap metal in this light. Every element of his appearance that commanded respect in human courts became diminished here, revealed as the costume it had always been.
Beside him, a small man in clerk's robes clutched a leather portfolio like a shield. Sweat had already soaked through his collar, creating dark stains that spread with each nervous breath. This would be the legal advocate, some poor soul who'd studied human law for decades only to find himself standing in a place where those laws meant less than the smoke rising from the magma veins.
Scarlet stood between them and the throne with the kind of stillness that made stones look restless. She'd changed into formal robes of deep purple that seemed to drink the red light rather than reflect it, and her face had become a mask of professional patience. She was managing them, I realized—keeping them contained without seeming to, preventing them from exploring the space or testing boundaries while maintaining the fiction of hospitality.
